NVIDIA Shield Tablet vs Toshiba Excite Write: Tablet Battle

Around the tablet market, the existence of note-taking devices can be considered as pretty rare, and only Samsung with its Samsung GALAXY Note series that can rule this market entirely.

However, besides this Note series from Samsung, there are actually many other great note-taking tablets that in fact are as great as Samsung GALAXY Note tablet.
In fact, i’ve already mentioned a lot about an awesome HP Slate 7 Extreme, a 7-inch note tablet that comes packed with its own stylus.

Not only can you use its stylus to take some simple notes, but you can literally create some beautiful paintings out of it.

And this already sounds amazing for an affordable $199 tablet like this.

However, today in this next comparison review, i’m not going to talk about Samsung GALAXY Note nor HP Slate 7 Extreme.

But i’m today more interested to bring up NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write in this review.

NVIDIA’s tablet – as you might know already – is actually the next-gen, or successor if you would, of Tegra Note (or HP Slate 7 Extreme).

So no wonder if this tablet still shares some similarity in terms of specs, design and especially stylus with Tegra Note, although NVIDIA Shield Tablet is just far greater than predecessor.

Meanwhile, the note-taking tablet from Toshiba Excite Write is actually something new around the market.

As a matter of fact, it’s pretty rare to find any Toshiba tablet lying around the tablet stores these days.

But i believe the comparison between these 2 devices could be pretty interesting to see - especially on their stylus experience and gaming performance as well (given their Tegra processors).

Well, if you’re interested to learn more about my comparison between these 2 tablets, including my take on their gaming performance and their whole aspect, then here you go, my comparison review between NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write.

Introduction

In the past few years, NVIDIA has been really consistent to bring what its best around the laptop/PC market – which is making powerful graphic cards –.

But around the tablet market, this company seems like it has much bigger goal to achieve than what it’s currently doing on laptop market.

And that is to build the strong bridge between laptop and tablet market, which is by delivering strong mobile graphic cards that are capable to deliver the same graphical power of today’s PC/desktop.

The good news is, this company’s goal could turn out to become reality in the near future.

And that’s thanks to its latest and greatest Tegra K1 processor, which is capable to deliver the same graphical power of today’s desktops/PCs and 3 times graphical performance as Apple’s A7 chipset (with PowerVR G6430 GPU).

And one of the devices that is really lucky to have this processor is NVIDIA Shield Tablet, which is not surprising given that it’s made by NVIDIA itself.

However, the thing that really impresses me a lot with this tablet is actually its stylus, which comes packed on this device.

As mentioned above, the stylus of this tablet is really amazing you can even create some beautiful paintings out of it.

In fact, the stylus of NVIDIA Shield Tablet can be considered as on par with the S-Pen of Samsung GALAXY Note tablet, in terms of writing and drawing experience especially.

Besides NVIDIA Shield Tablet, there’s also one other note-taking device coming from a manufacturer that actually is not really familiar to hear around the tablet market – Toshiba.

This company apparently also has its own stylus-equipped tablet and it’s called Toshiba Excite Write.

The thing that makes me really impressed with this device is interestingly not its stylus. It’s actually its spec sheet.

So in terms of specs sheet, i think both Toshiba Excite Write looks better than NVIDIA Shield Tablet.

But the questions remain, with all of the high-grade specs and powerful performance found on both devices,

Which one between NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write that is a better gaming tablet and note-taking device?

Do these 2 devices deserve to be positioned alongside other flagship rivals on today’s tablet market?

Is it worth it to buy NVIDIA Shield Tablet instead of Toshiba Excite Write? Why?

I will share the answers of these questions at the end of this review. So be sure to stick around.

Design

NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write are actually 2 different category devices, especially on the sector of screen size. NVIDIA’s tablet is equipped with 8-inch display, while Toshiba Excite Write has a much larger 10.1-inch display.

However, given that these 2 tablets are note-taking devices, not to mention, they are also powered by Tegra processor (but 2 different-generation Tegra processors by the way), then i think it’s still relevant to compare both of these devices.

The design of NVIDIA Shield Tablet – as you might know already -, takes some design cues from HTC’s flagship smartphone – HTC One, especially with the use of 2 different layer colors (gray and dark black around the side of the screen) plus with the same dual-front-speaker grilles.

So basically, it looks really solid and modern plus has its own identity compared to other Android tablets out there, which mostly look really generic one to another.

It has the the metallic trim all over the bezels, the corners are in rectangular shape and there's also dark black color on the front side around the screen.

Between this tablet and NVIDIA Shield Tablet, i think it’s quite clear that NVIDIA’s tablet is the clear winner here, especially thanks to its dual-front-speaker grilles that bring much better sound quality to this device.

Despite having a standard-looking design, there’s actually one thing that still makes this Toshiba tablet stand out compared to NVIDIA Shield Tablet.

And that is its spec sheet.

As a flagship device from Toshiba, this tablet is equipped with some beefy specs that are still considered as high-end hardware for today’s standards.

It has a 2.5K resolution (2560x1600 pixels) on its 10.1-inch display, a quad-core Tegra 4 processor, a staggering 72-core GeForce ULP GPU, 2GB of RAM, a pretty huge 33Wh battery with a promised 11 hours for talk time (multimedia), 8MP rear-facing camera with LED flash, microSD card for up to 32GB to support the 32GB native storage and some other more.

Meanwhile, NVIDIA Shield Tablet also looks good on the same sector.

It has a full HD 1920x1200 pixel display, a Tegra K1 quad-core processor with 192-core Kepler GPU, 2GB of RAM, microSD card for up to 128GB, 16GB native internal storage, 5MP cameras front and back, 19.75Wh battery and some other standard features. Not to mention, both tablets also come packed with its own stylus.

Screen

According to one review i’ve seen on YouTube about Toshiba Excite Write, the screen of this tablet looks really gorgeous and insanely sharp.

But that’s not surprising especially given its crazy super-high 2.5K resolution on its 10.1-inch display.

And this is really far from the grasp of NVIDIA Shield Tablet, which only comes with a full HD 1920x1200 pixel resolution on its 8-inch display.

So in terms of sharpness, it’s definitely Toshiba Excite Write that deserves the crown here compared to NVIDIA Shield Tablet.

Even so, having a full HD resolution on a small 8-inch display is still considered as great and in fact, it already looks really sharp and gorgeous for most of users.

User Interface

Both devices actually share the same Android platform. However, when it comes to UI, there is a very thin line between NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write.

NVIDIA’s tablet comes with a stock vanilla Android UI with some added features and tasks related to its stylus.

Meanwhile, Toshiba Excite Write receives some customizations and tweaks from the manufacturer especially on its interface and icons, plus some added features and tasks for its stylus.

So between these 2 tablets, i think NVIDIA Shield Tablet has a much better software because it doesn’t inundate the whole system and memory with some heavy loads, making it perform much faster and smoother, plus more efficient with the use of battery life.

And if this device already receives the Android 5.0 Lollipop (which has been released by NVIDIA lately), then its performance and battery life will be much improved than with the existing software build.

But on the bright side of Toshiba Excite, this tablet is powered by Tegra 4 processor and there’s also a huge 2GB of RAM provided by the manufacturer.

So even if this device comes with Toshiba’s customized UI, its performance is still fast and smooth, especially for doing some basic daily tasks.

Stylus

Both NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write come packed with their own stylus. So if you’re looking for another alternative for Samsung GALAXY Note tablet, these 2 devices could probably be your other options on the market today.

However, when it comes to writing experience on these 2 tablets – according to what i’ve seen on YouTube -, the stylus of NVIDIA Shield Tablet is way better by miles than the stylus of Toshiba’s tablet.

And that can be seen clearly on how it performs when registering the results to the tablet.

So the stylus of NVIDIA Shield Tablet is really amazing.

It has a better and fast response on the screen, the results of the stylus is real time on-the-fly to the screen and its thickness can be easily controlled according to your pressure of the stylus on the screen.

Not to mention, there’s also this palm-rejection feature to prevent your palm from being registered on the screen when using the stylus. As a matter of fact, the stylus of this tablet is so great you can literally create some beautiful paintings out of it – similar just the S-Pen on Samsung GALAXY Note tablet.

This really contradicts with the stylus of Toshiba Excite Write that is not as great as the stylus of NVIDIA’s tablet, let alone the S-Pen on Samsung GALAXY Note.

And that can be seen clearly on how its thickness cannot be controlled manually with your pressure and must be set first in the setting manually.

So everytime you want to draw picture with different use of thickness, you must always go the setting (or top navigation on the screen) and pick the thickness of stylus according to your needs.

And this can be pretty annoying and ruin the writing or drawing experience on this device.

So long story short, the stylus and writing experience of NVIDIA Shield Tablet is far better than the stylus of Toshiba Excite Write.

Not to mention, this NVIDIA’s tablet also has much better features and added tasks related to stylus, compared to Toshiba’s tablet – although it still has it too on its software.

Back to Top
As 2 Tegra-powered tablets - especially with the latest-gen Tegra processors -, no doubt that both NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write are 2 perfect machines for playing games.

Toshiba Excite Write is equipped with a powerful Tegra 4 processor along with its 72-core GPU, while NVIDIA Shield Tablet receives the most advanced more powerful Tegra K1 processor, coupled with 192-core Kepler GPU.

So basically, these 2 tablets really excel in terms of gaming performance.

And you can throw any Android games – even the most graphically demanding games like Asphalt 8: Airborne, Modern Combat 5 or GTA San Andreas – on any of these tablets and these games will run in buttery smooth performance and of course, in full highest graphics.

However, as the one with the more advanced Tegra K1 processor, it’s no brainer that the gaming performance of NVIDIA Shield Tablet is far greater and more powerful than Toshiba Excite Write.

And it doesn’t take genius to guess that.

It’s because this Tegra K1 processor, accompanied with a staggering 192-core Kepler GPU, is capable to deliver the same graphical performance as today’s desktops/PCs.

This according to game and Unreal Engine developers by the way.

Meanwhile, based on the benchmark test held by some tech sites across the net, this Tegra K1 processor managed to top Apple’s A7 SoC (system-on-chip) with 3 times more powerful graphic performance.

So with that being said, then it’s really clear that NVIDIA Shield Tablet is far superior compared to Toshiba’s tablet.

But that’s not it.

Given its same graphical performance as today’s desktops, there are many console/PC game developers that will port their popular titles specifically for Tegra K1 devices like NVIDIA Shield Tablet.

Added with NVIDIA’s close relationship with famous game makers like Ubisoft, Activision, EA, and many more, then you can expect some console-quality games for this tablet in the near future.

There is also one other great thing that makes the gaming experience of NVIDIA Shield Tablet much better than on Toshiba Excite Write.

And that is its dual-front-speaker grilles that’s able to deliver a better sound speaker quality.

As a matter of fact, according to many reviews on YouTube, the sound quality of NVIDIA Shield Tablet is really loud and clear, making the experience of playing games on this tablet more realistic.

So with all of these extra points for NVIDIA’s tablet in terms of gaming experience, i think it’s quite obvious now that NVIDIA Shield Tablet is a much better gaming tablet than Toshiba Excite Write.

This NVIDIA’s tablet may not have the same 2.5K display just like Toshiba’s device (which would look great for gaming), however, as a whole, this device delivers a far better gaming performance and experience to the users.

Besides, Tegra 4 tablets are mostly plagued with overheating issue. And this also happens to Toshiba Excite Write (according to some reviews on YouTube).

So this makes it even harder for this Toshiba Excite Write to match NVIDIA Shield Tablet in terms of overall gaming experience.

Anyway guys, if you want to know more about the gaming performance of NVIDIA Shield Tablet and Toshiba Excite Write, including what games that will run on these tablets, check out my YouTube video playlist or Pinterest page. :)

Cameras

Toshiba Excite Write may not be as great as NVIDIA Shield Tablet when it comes to stylus, writing experience, gaming performance and software, however, there’s still one part of this device (besides its screen) that probably could put it up ahead against the NVIDIA Shield Tablet.

And that is its camera. Toshiba Excite Write is equipped with an 8MP rear-facing camera with LED flash, as opposed to the 5MP rear-facing camera without LED flash on NVIDIA Shield Tablet.

So besides great with its sharpness when taking photos, the camera of Toshiba’s tablet is also better in low-light condition, thanks to its LED flash.

However, it doesn’t straightly mean that the camera of NVIDIA Shield Tablet will be inferior just because it doesn’t have higher megapixel than Toshiba’s tablet.

Well, that’s totally wrong about that. In fact, according to many reviews on YouTube, the 5MP cameras (both front and back) of this NVIDIA tablet are impressively capable to take some decent quality shots.

This is actually not very surprising given that the predecessor – Tegra Note -, also has great cameras.

So even if you pick any of these 2 devices randomly and you also happen to love photography, then you’ll make no mistake because both tablets take great photos and videos.

Battery Life

Most of today’s tablets really count mostly on the software optimization in order to have longer battery life.

In fact, Samsung has been doing a lot of improvements and developments of its screen technology, processor and of course, TouchWiz UI, to make its GALAXY devices last longer in battery life, despite using smaller battery capacity. And this is the same thing that also happens on NVIDIA Shield Tablet.

With the update of Android 5.0 Lollipop already arriving for this tablet, this will surely help a lot in making this tablet more efficient with the use of battery.

And this thanks to Google that has made a lot of tweaks and improvements on its Android software, not to mention add some new features related to battery saving mode, in order to ensure that all Android Lollipop devices can last very much longer even in heavy use.

This actually has been proven on Google Nexus 5 that now has much much improved battery life, thanks to the Lollipop update.

So in terms of battery life, i think NVIDIA Shield Tablet is much better than Toshiba Excite Write.

However, this Toshiba’s tablet is actually not too shabby at all given that it’s powered by a huge 33Wh battery capacity inside. So you can expect to see both tablets last in one solid day – of course in moderate use.

My Personal Opinions

So in conclusion, i think it’s pretty obvious that i will definitely go with NVIDIA Shield Tablet than Toshiba Excite Write, in the whole aspect.

It may not have the same super-sharp 2.5K display or higher 8MP camera with LED flash just like the ones found on Toshiba’s tablet, however, when it comes to many other sectors – like design, sound quality, gaming experience, graphical performance, software, features, UI and of course, the stylus – of course, NVIDIA Shield Tablet is far greater than Toshiba’s tablet.

Besides, having a full HD 1920x1200 pixel resolution on a small 8-inch display is already considered great for most of even tech users.

Not to mention, its 5MP cameras have been proven their quality on many tech reviewers on YouTube.

So it’s just no brainer to pick NVIDIA Shield Tablet as a much better tablet than Toshiba Excite Write.

Besides, Toshiba Excite Write is plagued with some issues: like overheating, not-very-attractive design, plus Toshiba hasn’t been really popular around the tablet market.

So this company still needs to prove its worth on this market, especially with the quality of its products.

But even so, according to some reviews on YouTube, the screen of Toshiba Excite Write is really gorgeous with great color saturation and reproduction, not to mention, it’s powered by Tegra 4 processor (which is MADE for gaming).

So there are still some great things to be liked from this device.

But if you ask me, i will totally pick up NVIDIA Shield Tablet straight away. No question asked.

Disclaimer: Hi guys, bear in mind that this is not some in-depth review. This is Read more...